Poor performance on Linux with NVIDIA 560 and up

[mfischer]

Since NVIDIA drivers 560 (including newest 565.71) I have abysmal performance on every kernel (6.8 to 6.12) and every distribution (from Debian to Arch). Instead of 100fps I‘m getting 10 to 15. Activating Vsync in game “boosts“ this to 25. Does anybody have an idea what causes this?

[mfischer]

Sadly, seems to be a bit more complicated. Thought it was Wayland at some point, but I have experienced similar behavior in x11 under Arch/565. It is a bit better, but there are these weird sync issues too. Only combo that works is Ubuntu 24 with 555 under Wayland. Arch on the other hand doesn’t play nice with 555, only 550. But 550 is a glitch fest that renders the desktop unusable.

[Doktor_Pancreatic_Cancer]

I'm not sure how related my problem is, but I have had performance, compatibility, and stability issues ever since I started using NVIDIA drivers 550 through 565 on a multitude of distros (Arch and Ubuntu based) and kernels (6.6, 6.8, 6.9, 6.11). I also still have similar issues with both Proton and native Steam games either freezing soon after launch or even causing full system freezes. The workaround I found is to add -force-(insert the game's graphics API such as vulkan or dx12) to the launch options, and playing the game in borderless mode if that alone doesn't work. I don't remember ever having any problems on any games when I was using the 535 or 545 drivers from Ubuntu/Mint, using Intel integrated graphics, or playing on the Steam Deck, so this must be an NVIDIA driver issue.

[mfischer]

Nah, after the early November update Cities stopped working on my Steam Deck as well. In my humble opinion blaming everything on NVidia is getting old and has become an excuse for devs. By the end of the day 80 % of gamers are using NVIDIA and Linux will never become a desktop alternative if this isn‘t fixed in a way that a client/kernel or whatever update doesn’t break everything. You can‘t just say f**k them if you want to crawl out of 2 to 4 percent market share.

[MarkJohnson]

SteamOS seems set to take over Linux gaming. Hopefully in native Linux, but I won't be holding my breath.

[Leopold Butters Stotch]

As much as I hate Windows 11 and all the copilot spyware, ads and ai garbage, I'd rather tolerate that than use Linux for gaming in the broken state it has always existed in.

[db48x]

Then you should try Linux again. It’s not broken. It literally just works.

I’ll reiterate that you should talk to nvidia’s tech support. It’s their driver, it’s not open source, therefore they have to fix any issues that crop up, like subpar performance. They’re the only ones who can.

[Tsubame ⭐]

Nguyên văn bởi Leopold Butters Stotch:

As much as I hate Windows 11 and all the copilot spyware, ads and ai garbage, I'd rather tolerate that than use Linux for gaming in the broken state it has always existed in.

Most of that can be uninstalled or disabled.

[mfischer]

Nguyên văn bởi db48x:

Then you should try Linux again. It’s not broken. It literally just works.

I’ll reiterate that you should talk to nvidia’s tech support. It’s their driver, it’s not open source, therefore they have to fix any issues that crop up, like subpar performance. They’re the only ones who can.

No, it isn‘t. If you introduce changes in your app/framework without testing on common platforms you can‘t just tell everyone to keep up with you, because you made those changes public when you released the code. I mean yes, you can do that. Users have to wait for two weeks to get things fixed but this way you won‘t compete with Windows. But before this threads totally becomes a whole open vs closed source discussion: Seems there is no solution at hand and we just have to wait until someone comes up with a fix. In the meantime I‘ll keep using Windows for playing Cities Skylines where it worked for me for years no matter which CPU/GPU I had.

[Krupo]

tl;dr - clean up mods and see if it fixes things.

Nguyên văn bởi Leopold Butters Stotch:

Trying to play games on Linux sounds exhausting. I'd be too tired to even play after the weeks of troubleshooting just to make a game launchable.

Fortunately almost every game I've tried has worked rather well.

CS was briefly an exception - I'm surprised no one has asked OP how many mods (if any) they have installed.

I ran into an issue where I loaded up a blank map, and performance was awful, with all graphics settings turned down.

I scanned the forums and noted people pointing out the overhead that mods place on the game. While a month or two ago I tried CS and it worked 'ok' with my giant library of mods, I was inspired by one player's guide to PRUNE my collection hard. No reason a blank map should suffer unless there's something weird going on - and apparently CS loves to pre-load all the mod assets even on a blank map.

And guess what: I kept just 20-30 of my favourite mods and dumped a bunch of custom buildings I honestly don't use anymore. Performance was back to "normal." Worth trying for OP. (And my original Windows install would've probably run better had I done this earlier.)

[Bedna]

A bit of a necro thread, but the missinformation in here is mindblowing so I feel a cleanup of facts could be useful.

1. If you game NATIVELY on linux, it is up to YOU to make sure every little dependency is correct, version and all.
Steam spoonfeeds you a solution to that though, use a proton prefix and let proton translate whatever calls the game makes (dx11, dx12, opengl, whatever) into vulcan.
The TINY overhead proton adds, you wont even notice it.
Best "default" prefix if you are NOT using a steam deck is proton-experimental.
IMHO though, proton-ge woks better, (god bless GloriousEggroll) but that is MY experience, others might have different experiences.

2. Nvidia drivers are just as closed as Radeon drivers.
So here is the thing.
Radeon is a closed source driver for AMD, but it's not really needed any more for most people.
But the same can be said about nvidia nowdays since they released open kernel modules. If you only game, the open drivers are probably all you need.
If you want to utilize the full potential when using local AI though you probably want the closed with cuda support. Cuda is more or less all that is closed, and since AMD doesn't have any of that kind of patented tech, there is not really any need for any proprietary driver, but they still provide one, and the name is Radeon.

The argument "nvidia closed, nvidia bad, blame nvidia for all" is pretty much only ppl who actually have zero clue as to what they are talking about. Nvidia works very well, even with wayland.
Nvidia is also one of top 5 code providers to the Linux kernel, like, they provide a LOT for free to the kernel... A bit beside the point but somehow ppl seem to forget/miss that...

3. MS recall CAN NOT BE UNINSTALLED OR REMOVED,
Recall that I saw mentioned in bypass in this thread, is a DEPENDENCY to explorer.exe.
It is IMPOSSIBLE to remove if you want to start windows. Just a fact.
It CAN be disabled, but as ms has shown in the past, they don't care about your setings, "they know better what you want".
If they want, they just activate it again in an update without telling you.

4. Gaming on linux is in a REALLY great state.
90% of all my games on steam "just works" (if I use proton-ge).
The only ones that does not are games ("coincidentally", all of them AAA games) requiring kernel level anti cheat.
NO GAME IN THE WORLD HAS ANYTHING TO DO IN KERNEL SPACE!!!
How insecure that is has already been proven. Ransomware via Genshin Impact kernel level anti cheat comes to mind, google it...
I repeat: GAME RELATED CODE HAS NOTHING TO DO IN KERNEL SPACE!!! (and microsoft actually seems to agree according to some blogposts that came out in the last few weeks, not because of gaming, but as a followup reaction to that little thing that happened in combination with a croudstrike KERNEL DRIVER)
NO GAME, is more valuable than your security (unless you are a pro gamer ofc, Remember that time a player got hacked live in a tournament and the hacker activated wallhacks? xD)

5. I have actually not tried THIS game on linux,
But the dumpster fire of a followup game, I have. That runs better on linux, because vulkan is THAT freaking good.
I even saw a thread on the CS2 steam forums with instructions how to use proton on windows, to get better framerate... LMAO

Heck, before I completely switched over about a year ago, I used to run dual boot with win11. Control Ultimate edition with raytracing on my 3090, well, HIGHER FPS on linux than on windows.
Again, because Vulkan is THAT FREAKING GOOD!

I use arch.... BTW...

[mfischer]

I can agree to a lot but I‘ll have to correct one thing if someone stumbles over this thread: You cannot run Cities Skylines with Proton because Patch Loader doesn’t work with Proton, which means you lose half of your fps. This is why a solution for the native Linux game is needed.

[Bedna]

ProtonDB begs the differ: https://www.protondb.com/app/255710 GOLD rating...
There is even this comment:

I initially tried to play the native version but it refused to acknoledge my dedicated gpus exsistence. Switched to proton and that fixed it

Are you even sure you utilize your dGPU and not your iGPU?!?

But ok, let me be of service to the community.
Since I have NEVER ran this game on linux, I just pressed "install".
I will come back with an edit on if it works or not.
I am 95% certain it will just work ootb (with proton-GE)

Edit 1:
Ok, it's installed, and is now pulling 55pages of mods that I completely forgot I had (55x10=550 assets and mods, that sounds insane, was that how I used to play this game back in the day?!? :-O) subscribed to in the workshop, but lets try with them all instead of removing.
This is to test if "it just works" so it would not be fair for me to remove those mods.. xD (but I might have to, a lot of them are probably out of date)

Edit 2:
IDK what to tell you buddy...
I started the game, launcer opened and told me to restart it to update, i did, started the game from the launcher, it warned me about a crapton of mods being out of date (I think that is a mod by itself) and even gave me a link to a page that was created pinpointing each of every mod, if it was gamebreaking, ood, removed etc..
But you know what?
I said just work, so I pressed "start new game" and....
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3401829661

No problem whatsoever, but it would probably crash if I kept playing with all those mods installed.

But this is just a proof of concept.
USE THE TOOLS AVAILABLE FOR YOU, in this case proton.

Edit 3:
Eeeh, I forgot, the mods are not activated, just downloaded, that is why it works, but I think all assets are.
I also forgot to check fps, I just started, took a screenshot and exited... And now I have uninstalled it... darn it..

[mfischer]

Sorry, the author himself stated, that it won‘t work and never will.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/comments/2041457644

And now I will stop having these tiresome discussions with die hard Linux fans. 😅 This thread was about a fix for an existing problem.

[Leopold Butters Stotch]

Linux fanboys keep typing walls of text riddled with contradictions while the goalposts keep moving.

[Bedna]

Nguyên văn bởi mfischer:

And now I will stop having these tiresome discussions with die hard Linux fans. 😅 This thread was about a fix for an existing problem.

Feel free to not participate.
But don't come here telling others what they can or can not type or discuss.

Also... Whut?

Nguyên văn bởi mfischer:

Sorry, the author himself stated, that it won‘t work and never will.

The latest comment on the link you sent was by the dev and says:

maybe skyve profile is broken, try resetting or creating new one in the skyve app and see if that changes anything.

That does not sound like a dev that says "it will never work"..

Nguyên văn bởi Leopold Butters Stotch:

Linux fanboys keep typing walls of text riddled with contradictions while the goalposts keep moving.

I'm not trying anything, I'm INFORMING, and there are no contradictions other than in your imagination.
Yes, learning usually involves reading, and If that is difficult for you, it says more about you than anything else clown.

Besides, nothing of what was written was directed to you (not even the MS recall thing was).
You made it very clear you value some game over security.
The post was made to ppl who use linux and therefore are more likely to understand the content. You clearly don't.